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THE FRESHWATER FRONTIER: WHY MICHIGAN IS THE MOST UNDERRATED DEVELOPMENT MARKET IN AMERICA

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By Daniel Kaufman | May 2026 People ask me constantly where I see the next wave of real estate opportunity. They expect me to say Texas. Maybe Florida again. Sometimes they’re hoping I’ll say something contrarian like Cleveland or Gary, Indiana, so they can nod and feel sophisticated. I’m going to say Michigan. Not the Michigan of the rust belt narrative. Not “Detroit comeback story #47.” I’m talking about three specific markets that most coastal developers haven’t touched — and that’s exactly the point. The Upper Peninsula. Traverse City. Grand Rapids. Three completely different stories with one connecting thread: fresh water. You want to talk about the most undervalued long-term infrastructure asset in the world? It’s not data centers. It’s not lithium. It’s clean, abundant, accessible freshwater. And Michigan sits on top of more of it than almost anywhere on earth. Let me break this down market by market. THE UPPER PENINSULA: AMERICA’S LAST FRONTIER DISCOUNT Here’s a number that sho...
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THE FED JUST GOT A NEW BOSS. HERE’S WHY EVERY DEVELOPER SHOULD CARE.

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​ Kevin Warsh walked into the Federal Reserve on Friday as its new chairman. Jerome Powell walked out — sort of. Powell, whose term as chair expired, is staying on the Fed’s board of governors. That means Warsh will be voting on rate policy alongside the man he replaced. If you think that dynamic isn’t going to create friction, I have a bridge loan to sell you. Let’s be honest about what this moment is. It’s historic. It’s messy. And it has direct downstream consequences for every developer financing a deal right now. The Setup Is Complicated Trump pushed Powell out in all but name — hammering him publicly for over a year for keeping rates too high. Now he’s installed Warsh, a former Fed governor who served during the Great Recession, with a four-year term as chair and a 14-year seat on the board. The message from the White House is unmistakable: get rates down. The problem? The FOMC isn’t listening. At last month’s meeting, three hawks — Cleveland’s Beth Hammack, Minneapolis’s Neel Ka...
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The Supply Myth: Why Building More of the Same Won't Save Burlington

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​ By Daniel Kaufman — May 2026 I've been developing workforce and affordable housing in New England long enough to recognize a zombie idea when I see one. The zombie in question: if you just build more units, prices will fall. It sounds so reasonable. It's Econ 101. Increase supply, reduce price. Works great for soybeans. Doesn't work nearly as cleanly for the thing people sleep in. A newly published study out of UVM — authored by economist Joe Ament and doctoral student Chris McElroy — just put some real data behind that skepticism, specifically in Burlington. The researchers analyzed more than 4,000 single- and two-family home sales over two decades, from 2003 to 2023, and what they found should reshape the policy conversation across all of New England, not just Vermont. THE NUMBERS THAT STOP YOU COLD Burlington's average home price nearly tripled over the study period, climbing from roughly $188,000 in 2003 to almost $500,000 by 2023 — with the steepest acceleration ...
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Raw Land Up 87% Since 2019. The Correction Is Here. Here’s What It Means for Developers.

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Let me give you the number that should have every land-hungry developer paying attention: raw land prices surged 86.5% between early 2019 and March 2026. Not build-ready lots. Not partially improved parcels. Raw dirt. The stuff with no utilities, no clearing, no entitlements — just acreage and a dream. According to Realtor.com’s first-ever land listing analysis, overall land prices per acre climbed roughly 77% over that same stretch, while inventory of for-sale parcels cratered 24%. The pandemic lit a fire under a market that was already supply-constrained, and developers — chasing historically cheap debt — ran hard at every acre they could find. The result? A tiered appreciation story. • Raw land: +86.5% • Semideveloped parcels: +80% • Build-ready lots: +53.3% Why did raw land outrun everything else? Two reasons, according to Realtor.com senior economist Joel Berner. First, it started from a lower price point — more room to run. Second, build-ready lots have a natural ceil...
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Maine Just Shot Itself in the Foot — And Called It a Win

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​ Posted by Daniel Kaufman | April 2026 Let me be direct: LD 307 — Maine’s new moratorium on data center construction — is one of the most economically self-destructive pieces of legislation this state has passed in a generation. And I say that as someone who has spent years fighting for economic opportunity across this state’s forgotten mill towns, mountain communities, and post-industrial corridors. Maine just became the first state in the country to ban the construction of data centers larger than 20 megawatts. That ban runs until November 2027. The stated goal is to give the state time to “study” the potential energy impacts. The actual result? We just hung a “Closed for Business” sign on the door — and every competing state is already circling our opportunities like vultures. I have skin in this game. We have multiple micro data center projects in active planning stages across the state of Maine. Projects that would have brought hundreds of construction jobs, permanent technology ...
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An Open Letter from a Pass Holder: Sunday River, It’s Time to Listen

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​ On Boyne’s drift, Killington’s reawakening, and the little mountain in New Hampshire that quietly showed everyone how it’s done. By Daniel Kaufman | April 2026 I’m a Sunday River pass holder. I own property there. I love that mountain — the eight interconnected peaks, the snowmaking that won’t quit, the community of people who’ve made Western Maine’s ski scene their winter home. This piece comes from love, not grievance. But love sometimes means telling the truth. Let me say upfront: Boyne Resorts is not the enemy. They’re not Vail. They’re a family-owned company that’s been around since 1947, still run by the Kircher family, and they have made real capital investments at Sunday River — new lifts, snowmaking upgrades, infrastructure improvements that matter. Credit where it’s due. But something has been drifting. And when you compare what’s happening at Sunday River to what Killington is doing under new independent ownership — and to what a small mountain in Jackson, New Hampshire is...
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The Greatest Retail Empire in American History — Built, Neglected, and Looted

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How Sears went from selling houses out of a catalog to five stores and a website — and how one hedge fund manager got rich watching it burn. Part One: The Company That Invented American Shopping Before Amazon. Before Walmart. Before the mall. There was Sears. In 1886, a Minnesota railroad station agent named Richard Sears bought a crate of watches a local jeweler didn’t want. He sold them to other station agents along the rail line. That was the spark. He moved to Chicago, hired a watchmaker named Alvah Roebuck, and by 1893 Sears, Roebuck and Company was open for business. The big idea wasn’t a store. It was a catalog. In an era when print media reigned supreme, Sears dominated the rural retail market through its massive catalog. Titled the Book of Bargains and later The Great Price Maker, the famous Sears catalog expanded in the 1890s from featuring watches and jewelry to including everything from buggies and bicycles to sporting goods and sewing machines. It educated millions of shop...
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